Memory cards are known in the art and contain intelligence in the form of a memory circuit or other electronic program. Some form of card reader reads the information or memory stored on the card. Such cards are used in many applications in today's electronic society, including video cameras, digital still cameras, smartphones, PDA's, music players, ATMs, cable television decoders, toys, games, PC adapters, multi-media cards and other electronic applications. Typically, a memory card includes a contact or terminal array for connection through a card connector to a card reader system and then to external equipment. The connector readily accommodates insertion and removal of the card to provide quick access to the information and program on the card. The card connector includes terminals for yieldingly engaging the contact array of the memory card.
The memory card, itself, writes or reads via the connector and can transmit between electrical appliances, such as a word processor, personal computer, personal data assistant or the like. The card may be used in applications such as mobile or cellular telephones which are actuated and permit data access after identifying an identification code stored on a SIM (subscriber identification module) card. The SIM card has a conductive face with an array of contacts, and the mobile phone has a SIM card connector with terminals for electrical connection with the contacts of the SIM card to ensure the subscriber identification confirmation.
A typical memory card connector includes some form of dielectric housing which is covered by a metal shell. The metal shell may be stamped and formed of sheet metal material and formed substantially into a box-shape. The metal shell and the housing combine to define a card-receiving cavity. One end of the cavity is open to form a card-insertion opening. The dielectric housing may be generally L-shaped or U-shaped and includes a rear terminal-mounting section at the rear of the cavity, and at least one longitudinal side wall section extends forwardly from one or both ends of the rear section at one or both sides of the cavity. The metal shell has a top plate substantially covering the dielectric housing, with side plates extending downwardly over the side wall sections of the housing. One or both of the side wall sections of the housing define the sides of the card-receiving cavity.
Some card connectors include a card ejector mechanism whereby the memory card is simply inserted into the connector, and the ejector mechanism is used to facilitate removal of the card from the connector. Some ejector mechanisms include slider members which engage the memory card for movement therewith into and out of the connector. Latches, cams, eject devices and other operative components then are operatively associated with the slider rather than the memory card itself. It is known to provide the ejector mechanism with a latch or lock member which may be on the slider, itself, and which is engageable with a latch or lock portion of the memory card, such as a cut-out or notch in a side edge of the card. One type of card ejector mechanism includes a heart-shaped cam slot in the slider, with a pin member operatively biased into the heart-shaped cam slot, and with a spring member to normally bias the slider in a direction of withdrawal of the memory card. This type of card ejector mechanism is called a “push/push type” ejector in that the memory card first is pushed into the cavity of the connector to a latched operative position, and a second push on the card is effective to release the card and allow the spring to eject the card from its latched position.
One or more of the above design features of conventional memory card connectors and/or ejector mechanisms are shown in Japanese Patents Laid-Open 2001-85089; 2001-257029; 2001-291552; 2002-83651; 2002-237351 and 10-144422.
Unfortunately, almost all ejector mechanisms, including the slider-type mechanisms described above, are mounted on one of the side wall sections of the connector housing which define the sides of the card-receiving cavity, and this tends to increase the overall size of the card connector envelope, when miniaturization and size-reduction have become most desirable in memory card connectors. In other words, the ejector mechanisms function generally in the plane of the memory card in the connector, outside the overall envelope of the memory card, itself, and this increases the card connector size. In fact, the side wall sections of the housing contribute to the overall size of the connector without the ejector mechanism added thereto. As an example, when such memory card connectors are mounted on a printed circuit board, the space or “real estate” on the printed circuit board is at a premium, and any efforts to reduce the overall size of the connector results in an increase in the useful space on the surface of the circuit board. The present invention is directed to solving these problems by having the metal shell define the opposite sides of the card-receiving cavity of the connector, with a card ejector mechanism mounted on a side wall section of the housing at a level beneath the memory card, i.e., the ejector mechanism operates within the envelope of the memory card, itself, and does not significantly increase the size of the card connector. The present invention is effective to significantly reduce the size of card connectors of the prior art as described or enumerated above.